Meanwhile, Taiwan was staging a recovery operation after the storm dumped more than 80ins of rain on some southern counties.

Flooding on Friday and Saturday was the worst to hit the area in half a century, the Central Weather Bureau reported.

Taiwan's Disaster Relief Centre said a woman was killed when her vehicle plunged into a ditch in Kaohsiung county in heavy rain, while two men drowned in Pingtung and Tainan. It said 31 others were missing and feared dead.

Nearly one million people were evacuated from China's eastern coastal provinces by - more than 490,000 people in Zhejiang and 480,000 in neighbouring Fujian. Authorities in Fujian called 48,000 boats back to harbour.

Thirty-nine flights from Wenzhou city in Zhejiang were cancelled today, the official Xinhua News Agency said.

Village officials in Zhejiang rode bicycles to distribute drinking water and instant noodles to residents stranded by deep floods.

Heavy rains before the typhoon made landfall destroyed five houses in the province, burying four adults and a four-year-old boy in debris, Xinhua said. The child died after emergency treatment failed.

Morakot, which means "emerald" in Thai, was expected to travel north at about 6mph and weaken in strength, the meteorological administration said. It said the storm would also bring strong winds and heavy rains to nearby areas, including Shanghai.